Collisions & Claims

Collisions, Fires & Spills on England’s Motorways and Major Roads.

Information provided by Claims Management & Adjusting Ltd – a director of the company being described as an ‘expert witness’ by lawyers acting for Highways England (HE). These pages consider the routine overstatement of claims from Highways England, Councils, TfL and their contractors. A situation that appears to be a far cry from the Parliamentary note (uksiem_20150378_en) concerning what the creation of Highways England Company Ltd was meant to achieve; a delegation of functions in order to achieve greater transparency and accountability!

More information about typical scenarios that see drivers, fleets and Insurers (Third Parties) subject to excessive demands for payment can be found here:

Collisions

Fires

Spills

09/2018 ‘Fat Cat’, Jim O’Sullivan earning £402,000 / year is to investigate contractors claims for costs involving vehicles they do not own or could not have been associated with an incident. Very unlikely … as another vehicle is discovered to have been stolen at the time it was seemingly repairing a highway! More about dodgy vehicles here

You, your driver or your insured has caused damage to ‘Crown Property’ (such as a barrier) either following collision, fluid spill (commonly fuel) or a fire. Are you being overcharged by the Public Authority responsible or their contract? The answer is almost commonly ‘yes’. In some areas:

if the repair cost is above £10,000, the Public Authority such as Highways England, is billed by their repairing contractor, pays the invoices then seeks recovery from you.

if the bill is below £10,000 the contractor is not paid by the Authority but pursues you, your insurer or your company (if a fleet vehicle) for the money.

The same staff (operatives) attend the incidents, the same vehicles (plant) and same components (materials) are used in the repair: so why are drivers fleets and insurers charged more for below-threshold repairs by the contractor than they charge their Public Authority client? Furthermore, with regard to above-threshold claims, do the Highways Authority rubber-stamp payment claims – it appears so.

It appears drivers, fleets and insurers are subsidizing road maintenance; that Public Authorities are aware of this, enable and permit it

“I also want to ensure that drivers only pay appropriately for the damage they do to Crown property. I’m sure the current process could be simpler and I know Tim and Nick will be working to achieve this. We are certainly putting a lot of effort into reconciling the past costs that you are talking about.”
Jim O’Sullivan
CEO Highways England 21/11/2016

But drivers, fleets and insurers are not paying appropriately, the process has not been simplified but complicated and exaggeration runs rife.

In 09/2015, Highways England advised with regard to their contractors“They can do what they like with their own claims, that’s absolutely nothing to do with us”. Similar quotes can be found at: ‘Highways England Do Not Care‘, with Highways England acknowledging that they also have difficulty obtaining information from their own contractors!In 11/2015 we asked pertinent questions of Highways England and a contractor’s extremely crude approach which we believed may be unlawful. The letter is here, to date we have received no response. However, after raising 1,000’s of invoices using the flawed methodology since mid 2014, likely exaggerating each by £1,000’s the contractor, now Kier Highways Ltd, abandoned the process. The replacement we believe to be overstatement in another form.

Indeed, what you will likely not be made aware of is that some contracts have built into them ‘protection’ for Third Parties (drivers, fleets & insurers) – but what use is a shield if you don;t know where to find it, or its existence?

About EnglandHighways.co.uk

www.englandhighways.co.uk is provided by Claims Management & Adjusting Ltd (CMA) Registered in England & Wales, registered office as above. Registration # 02955406, regsitered office Malling House, Town Hill, West Malling, Kent, ME19 6QL www.cmaclaims.co.uk CMA has taken reasonable care in sourcing and presenting the information contained on this site, but accepts no responsibility for any financial or other loss or damage that may result from its use